One late night in February 2022, in a small prayer room in Cape Town in South Africa, the Lord spoke to me. He said, “Jon, I want you to go to Ukraine. There is a need there.” It was as if He put His hands on my shoulder and said, “If you go, I will prepare the way before you.” Reinhart Bonkke once said why play with marbles when God tells us in the Bible that we can move mountains. I couldn’t sit down for two weeks without feeling incredibly emotional and moved by the Spirit. So after the two weeks, I found myself with my backpack, half a kilo of bakkwa and some clothes, ready to fly to Ukraine.

 

What I saw was revival!

God connected me to an organization called Awakening Europe so I wouldn’t have to go to the border alone. What I saw was a border filled with women and children running from a war. I ended up at the border where tens of thousands were crossing every day. And these people were broken and in need of hope. And so my job there was to care for the heart.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I would find myself in trains. I would go in there and say, “Hello my friends, we love to worship a song for the most High King today with you. It is a King who loves you and knows your heart.” Together with my team mates from Awakening Europe, we would sing spontaneous song ‘How Great is Our God.’ And once we started singing, people would start to weep. Mothers, grandmothers with their children in tow, with five, ten bags - their whole life possessions fleeing from the war, would start to receive the love of Yeshua right there and then. We would say “Jesus loves you and He died for you, and He came to redeem you.” And hands would go up and people would receive the love of Jesus into their hearts. What I saw there was revival!

 

I grew up in the Singaporean church very much like many of you. I have heard about revival. I have longed for it. I prayed for it. But twenty four years of my life, I have never seen anything like these happening at the border in Ukraine. I have seen an Orthodox priest healed.

 

I was praying for this Orthodox priest’s knees. I say, “In the name of Jesus, all pain go. I say let’s go and test it.” He comes with me. He runs up the staircase. His eyes widened. He started jumping up and down. And he said, “I can’t feel any pain.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Holy Spirit says to me … he was bullied when he was thirteen

The Lord is working something marvelous at the border. And he is just not working and healing in signs and wonders, he’s working in the heart. What I am seeing there is a lot of women, grandmothers, sons and daughters receiving Jesus. I was sitting with a boy in the train. His name is Milosh. And he received Jesus into his heart after I shared the Gospel with him. The Holy Spirit says to me that he was bullied when he was thirteen. And so I asked, “Milosh, were you bullied when you were thirteen?” And he said, “Yes.” He’s a small boy but has a kind smile. I said, “Let’s ask the Holy Spirit what He thinks of you.” We closed our eyes. I held his hands in prayer. After he pauses, he said, “Jon, the Holy Spirit is telling me that I am beloved. And I don’t need to look to anyone else for worth except Jesus.”

 

This journey has brought me much closer to the Father

My life has been changed, personally. I have never stood in front of trains. I have never preached the Gospel. Even here in Singapore, I can barely count the number of fingers I have how many people I brought to Christ. And it’d shaken my faith up to think that I have been living this life until now. Jesus plans for us: true religion is caring for the fatherless and the widows and preaching the love of Christ to them. And for me, this journey has brought me much closer to the Father than I have ever imagined before. I have learnt that evangelism is a lifestyle. I’ve learnt more in two weeks than I have in 24 years of living a relationship with God. The challenge for me before I went to Poland was this – how much do I trust my Father in heaven to work miracles. What I have learnt is that He can and He will.

 

My call for all of us is this: There is a revival going on not just in Ukraine but in our hearts. And He can speak to us and use us in marvelous ways as He has used me and many others. I hope this story encourages you and shows you that the Father is working. And even here is Singapore, He is waiting for revival. Someone wise once said, “It is us who brings the change, who brings the empty vessels for the Kingdom of God to be poured out.” In Jesus’ name, Amen.